


Overcharge Fees

by Schgain



Category: Klaus (Game)
Genre: ADHD, Addiction, Agender Character, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Borderline Personality Disorder, Canon Temporary Character Death, Disabled Character, Existential Crisis, Existentialism, F/F, F/M, KLAUS Spoilers, Mental Illness, Non-Linear Narrative, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Robot Feels, Three Laws of Robotics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-13
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-06-08 03:35:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6837547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Schgain/pseuds/Schgain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nothing is going to plan, Klaus has abandoned the team in the name of his latest existential crisis, and Player has decided to take a more hands-on approach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Power Tastes Like Ozone

"So you know why I have to do this, right. You understand? I hope you do. I don't want there to be any hard feelings between us." Klaus idly taps on the glass optic of the security camera. From where he floats, it’s easily in reach.  
  
"However... There's going to be a lot of other things between us now."  
  
Player frowns at the same time Klaus' mouth pulls into a smug grin that takes up most of their central monitor. A creak and the sound of a metal pulley sounds in their office, and Player turns just in time to see what happened: The blast doors leading into their tiny headquarters abruptly fall shut, thoroughly locking them in.  
  
"Did you like that one-liner? Heh. Came up with it myself." says Klaus, very nearly puffing out his chest. He flashes a manic blue eye at Player then, who leans back in their chair and takes a moment to rub their arm, where their barcode is tattooed. When Klaus gets the typical silent treatment that only PLayer is capable of, he huffs. It’s not long before the broadcast becomes shaky, a tremor rattling the already loose screws that hold it to the wall. A thundering soon follows, and Klaus turns his attention from Player to the approaching noise. They can see his hands ball into fists now, and after staring down the corridor he twists to shoot an accusing glare at the manhandled camera.

 

“What are you-- Are you sending K1 my way?! You know I beat him before, I- I can do it again! You’re not even slowing me down!” Klaus takes the camera in both hands and gives it a good shaking, one that leaves its optic cracked and the whole thing hanging by its wires. Player flinches from the monitor, despite the distance. They never could have thought Klaus would be frightening.

 

“This is what you must feel like, huh?” murmurs Klaus, mostly to himself. “All powerful. Unstoppable. It really does feel good.”  He flexes his hands, the only things in frame. “Pretty soon, _I’ll_ be running this place.” he sighs, content, and turns to look away. Player can’t follow his gaze, their camera dangling. The floors rattle again, and a familiar laugh reverberates off the walls.

  
"Damn, it's the big boy. Hold on, I'll deal with this-- don't go anywhere." without looking behind him Klaus raises one hand and zaps the camera. The already mostly-useless feed goes black.  
  
Player yells a wordless noise of frustration and hurt, then rubs their temples. They need to go back, need to help- it's why Doctor Spiegel built them, after all. They pull several more monitors into position, searching for K1. Searching for anyone.  
  
Every camera is offline- Klaus must be putting them out as he goes. His HUD is glowing a sickly enough blue that Player has to set it aside lest they start to click like a geiger counter, and without any visual aid, using K1's HUD will just be plain dangerous.  
  
Player simulates a sigh. Doctor Spiegel taught _them_ the three laws, why couldn't he teach the robots that matter?  
  
Maybe Doctor Spiegel had. Maybe he had, and the Three Laws simply don't _apply_ to other robots. Maybe they can all hurt each other as much as they want as long as no one involved is human.

 

Player simulates another sigh and turns to the third, final HUD. It’s much smaller and much simpler than the other two, little more than a touch screen with a 360 thumbstick and a D pad, accompanied by some buttons. On the bottom left hand corner there is a small barcode reader.

 

Player puts their wrist barcode to it, and it turns on.

  
“Warning!” says the automated Korp Announcer in a tinny voice. “Use of the QA K-UNIT HUB is prohibited unless in emergencies. Can you confirm this is an emergency?”  
  
Player makes a noise and jabs their finger onto the touchscreen. This act of impatience seems to do _something_ , because it goes straight to the main menu. They click “Help Manual”, equally impatiently.  
  
The help manual, as it turns out, is one page. In bright friendly letters, it reads:  
  


IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, SHUTT THE BLAST DOORS AND AWAIT FURTHER NOTICE. KORP CARES. 

 

Player sighs and rubs their face. God-- [EXPLETIVE OMITTED]. Time to do some digging of their own.  
  
  
\---

 

K1 doesn’t know what to do- Klaus is blazing a trail of destruction across the facility, Player is unbearably absent, and the sound of electricity buzzes unbearably loud in his ears. Closing his eyes, he hums a few tuneless notes in an attempt to blot out the noise. For a moment it works; the electric hum is gone and replaced with a gentle beeping, and--

 

K1 opens his eyes. An electronic screen displaying the Korp logo has changed, and now displays a small, nondescript pixelated animal. A little tune plays and the mounted security camera light turns on.

 

“Player!” K1 yells with a wide grin, recognizing these antics immediately. “Player came back!” he waves at the camera optic, bouncing on the balls of his feet. A line of text appears under the little animal:

 

_Hello, K1!_

 

“Klaus is gone,” says K1 with a frown and a nod. “He left K1 and Player behind.”

 

_We have to stop him._

 

K1 nods again, even more fervently. “K1 will help Player any way he can!”

 

_I can’t control anything. I’m locked in._  
  
Now that is a problem. K1 ponders for a moment, pulling at the remains of his tie. “Player could come meet K1?”

 

There is a very long pause before the next text comes up.  
  
_And I’m broken._

  
  


_\---_

 

The dialogue between Klaus and Player is full of misunderstanding... And silence.  
  
"I need a name for you. How about Player?"  
  
Player is not very good at Anthropomorphic Simulation- their android body is an afterthought (and perhaps a perceived kindness by Doctor Spiegel) at the best of times, and of course there’s precious few who get to see them that they could emote towards. But all the same their eyes widen- they had never, ever had a name before. Before this they had been QA K-UNIT v. 2.6.17, a partial entity to replace a broken partial entity and to make sure future whole entities were held to Korp standards.  
  
Player cannot respond, not really, and it makes them sad to know they cannot show their gratitude for Klaus' gesture. But Klaus seems to like it, so they will call themself that.  
  
The recording of the crying lady stirs something in player that they do not dwell on. Whatever skeleton that is, it is not their closet to open. But it sits in their metaphorical gut, heavy and leaden, and for a few minutes their previously-nimble fingers are slow to react. As if it is they who have forgotten someone, instead of Klaus.  
  
Later K1 joins, and it is startling. Player finds themself nearly overwhelmed at first by two to watch over, and Klaus' patience wears thin at the new teammate, but K1 is both pleasant and reliable. His faded carapace and tattered clothes and dim optics are not far off from Player’s own. There is camaraderie in this shabbiness.  
  
And when they are alone together? K1 speaks, startlingly profound, and Player's heart melts. There is strength in this softness.

 

(Like muscle under soft fat, says some distant part of their broken motherboard.)

 

\---

 

It is notoriously hard to get any of these electronic billboards remotely under command-- Doctor Spiegel is using everything in his power to make sure this goes according to plan. In fact, this seems to go so far as to even make camera repair a nuisance- only a few K2000s are put towards maintenance in the first place. Player almost puts in a _complaint_.

 

Slowly but surely the cameras come online, and Player continues to guide K1 towards the end of the purple floor. Looking at the unearthly blue glow that surrounds the violet hydraulics is unnerving, and Player almost swears they smell ozone. To think that this is so close to their office is nauseating. Well, as nauseating as a robot can get.

 

Finally, a screen goes from 0 DAYS SINCE LAST ACCIDENT to _K1, Wait._

 

K1, bless him, comically grinds to a halt and waves at the nearest camera.  
  
_At the door, instead of going to the next room, take the maintenance hall._

 

The look K1 gives Player can only be described as ‘quizzical’.

 

_This is a breakout._

 

K1’s confusion turns into a massive, toothy smile accompanied by a glint of mischief in his eyes. With that he nods, and takes off running towards the door.

 

Player leans back in their seat and simulates yet another sigh, this time one of relief.

 

\---

 

Let’s see what Klaus is up to.

 

Klaus floats a few inches off the ground, hands in fists to tight that his knuckles are white.

(From the titanium joints beneath his skin, he thinks with a sneer. The air grows heavy with humidity.)

 

But, chin up! There’s no more Player and no more K1, and the electricity thrums through his circuits warm and alive and this is the best he’s felt his entire life. He takes a moment to enjoy the high; he’s in no rush after all. Player and K1 are far behind, and all that’s separating Klaus from the outside world is…

 

… is…

 

...Dad.

 

Foreign anger rips through his body and it feels like he’s being torn apart and the air is choking him and he smells smoke and-

 

-and he’s on the floor. There’s a scorched mark in the hardwood depicting his silhouette and the smell of burnt hair permeates the room. He gets up with a small grunt, and stares, accusingly, at the oil painting of the mustached man hanging over the desk.

 

(He knows he should be in the purple area, but the thought of-- of what, revenge? Is thick and sickly sweet at the back of his throat.)

 

Another round of raw emotion flashes through him, and he can’t stop dwelling: pictures of him pulling the wires and bolts from a tear he’s opened in his forearm under his tattooed name, pictures of him counting the volts it’d take to kill a robot, how much it’d take to kill a human, how much more electricity he can have before he’ll kill _himself,_ and for a long moment his eyes are vacant.

 

He needs to distract himself. Klaus takes a deep breath, and heads towards the desk. On the edge, facing an audience, is a little plaque which reads “Property of Klaus Spiegel”.

 

Klaus snorts. “Not anymore,” he mutters, and knocks it off the desk.

 

And then he picks it back up, because it’s his name anyways. He ends up staring at it as his body moves to sit in the leather swivel chair, trying to find reason in a name painted in gold.

 

Another flash of anger, quick as lightning, hits him and he burns the last name off the plaque before setting it in place. That’s _not_ his name, and he is _not_ the man who made him.

 

For good measure, he props his feet up on the edge of the desk and leans back.

  
“Korp,” he says only to himself, “Is under new management.”


	2. Causation is not Correlation

The maintenance rails are built only with the K2000s in mind- where K1 isn’t breaking through too-small areas he’s navigating treacherous catwalks, ducking under hot pipes of steam, and side-shuffling through rows of forgotten filing cabinets. He ducks very low around anything near his head-- maybe even too much. But he doesn’t want to hit his head on anything ever again. Here there’s no floating, no Klaus, no puzzles. He can only hope to keep moving forward, to find Player and eventually leave this cursed area. 

His hope doesn’t make the trip any less stressful though. With this small reprise he is forced to his thoughts, and he cannot help but dwell. 

 

He cannot help but dwell.

\---

Klaus screams-- he’s been screaming for what feels like hours now and if he were human his throat would be hoarse (but he’s not so it isn’t) so it’s just one long, discordant note of pain. 

He thinks that if he dies this time, he’s not coming back. He’s never coming back to this Electric Purgatory, this pulsating limbo filled with nothing but his countless broken faces and monochrome walls. He’ll die by his own mistakes, alone and unloved, like an animal.

\---

Klaus isn’t on any of the cameras.

K1 isn’t on any of the cameras either, for that matter. 

The only one he can see is the QA Unit- the one he’s caught himself calling Player in his head- their form and chair silhouetted by the light of their own surveillance system. 

Dr. Spiegel swears. He adjusts the collar of his turtleneck. His throat hurts. He wants a fucking brandy.

_Language,_ Julia chides. 

He doesn’t turn around. He doesn’t need to be reminded that she’s not really there. He doesn’t need to remember, but he does anyways. He cannot help but dwell. He cannot help… but dwell.

~

“Do you think this is a good idea?” asks Julia. 

Dr. Spiegel doesn’t answer. 

Julia frowns and looks away, to the degree framed on her wall. It’s all she can do for now, but when she packs up her desk to retire to their rooms shortly after, she lingers. It’s only for a moment, but it’s enough to notice that Dr. Spiegel is still scratching out ideas onto blueprints, sitting hunched over his desk. He does not move to follow. 

On her way out of the Korp facility, their personal secretary asks her to sign some delivery forms. It’s routine, and Julia is going through the motions until--

Until she’s handed the pen, her fingers stay for a moment around her secretary’s. They lock eyes-- Julia’ are pink to go with her hair. She’s never noticed but the woman she’s looked at every day for four years has one blue eye and one yellow. Strange. 

They muster apologies overtop one another and Julia signs for the delivery with little flourish and less ado. 

“Mary!” Dr. Spiegel calls from the doorway. “I need you to place a call!” 

 

“I need to get back to work,” says Mary, clinically. 

“Right,” says Julia. She looks away from the little check-in counter back to Dr. Spiegel. Their moment of eye contact is, by comparison, stagnant.

She does not retire to his room that night.

~

When he finds her there is not enough left to bury.

\---

When K1 finds Player, he has a gash leaking oil on his forehead and a wide grin. The doors read in bright black letters and a biohazard symbol: DO NOT ENTER: QUALITY ASSURANCE. The handle that hasn’t been sawed off is solidly locked.

So he punches down the blast doors, metal crumpling under his fist and pulling away the silicon skin on his knuckles. As soon as the lock breaks, the lights turn red and an alarm blares. K1 clamps one hand over his ear and presses the other into his shoulder until he finds the panic box and yanks it out of the wall. But the doors cave in enough for him to pull them out of their frame The lights go out, and in the dark the only light comes from a half dome of screens. Sitting in a revolving chair, looking quite terrified, is a Klaus. 

No... not a Klaus, but K1 can’t be blamed for thinking that way. They have dark hair and the broad nose yes, but instead of blue their eyes are black with two yellow pinpricks of light from their dilating Apertures. Their hair isn’t in a pomp but rather hanging down in bangs with a generous coating of dust coating the fibres and their shoulders that turn the black to a faded grey. Perhaps they’re a new kind of K2000, thinks K1, but then he sees the rest of them. 

This robot wears a faded work shirt and a scrap of red silk knotted into a lopsided bow, but their body ends just past their hips in two stump joints. Between ragged fabric K1 can see the unused piston that would be a knee joint and double-jump spring, but…

But from the mid-thigh down there are no legs, just a mess of cables connecting the chair to whom he recognizes as Player. 

“You!” he yells, grin broadening. K1 belts out a laugh before muttering gibberish as he pulls forwards. Player’s face twitches, and finally pulls up into something K1’s facial recognition software can interpret as a smile. “K1 found Player!” 

They nod as vigorously as their unused joints can allow, their yellow eyes lighting up the machinations under their skin. They put down the tablet they had been holding and twist their torso to get at the mess of cables that cover their lower half and back and restrain them to the chair. At least their fingers are more deft than the rest of them; pulling out the wires looks painful but they make short work of the situation. K1, like Klaus, can usually tell what Player is getting at without them having to speak. This applies here- When they grab their tablet again they hold up their arms, and K1 hefts them into his embrace. 

“Let’s go get Klaus!” he says, and barrels out the door with his smaller friend in tow.


	3. Don't Start Quoting Me At The Beginning Of Your Chapters Too!

“Player, look!”

K1 turns abruptly and points, shifting his grip so as to not let his passenger and guide fall from their seat on his arms. They follow his gaze (and pointed finger) to a rare sight ever since they left the blue offices: a window. _Yes,_ they think, _I see there are windows._

But, _oh_ , Player realizes K1 doesn’t mean the window itself, but what lies beyond the pane of glass. 

The Korp building towers over the city’s buildings. In the distance, the ocean flat and infinite. It’s a study in brutalism, two opposing seas of concrete and water. From their vantage point of the skyscraper, Player can see the very curvature of the earth where white capped water meets a third ocean, one of a white and grey sky. 

Player is given pause; they had never seen the sky before. They know, of course, that it is usually blue. But the first impression of rolling heavy stormclouds makes the electricity in them thrum pleasantly. Between the cracks in the clouds late afternoon sun breaks through and scatters golden beams as the deluge crowds towards the ocean. And between these towers of light, pristine white flocks of seagulls soar in storm-charged thermals through the yellow sky.

This view in the ley of the storm keep K1 and Player enraptured for minutes, then longer, and they lose track of time watching this world just out of their grasp. The birds, the dispersing rain, the quiet cemented dignity of the cityscape. Slowly the sky goes from grey to a deep indigo-purple, and only when there is nothing left to see does K1 step forward for the two to place their hands on the glass, hours gone.

“The lights will come on now. K1 saw it before.” says K1 with a smile, looking down at his companion. He is pleased to know this fact. 

Player looks at him for a moment, and turns their yellow gaze back to the night. These lights K1 has seen before… The innate curiosity in them makes them pause once again. Player cannot help but dwell.

They wait again in silence, for the city to come alive with lights. 

But the darkness remains, and K1 frowns. When he’s sick of waiting, he steps away.

Player’s mind, however, is whirring, hot and alight and electric. They pull up definition after definition from the database in their silicon brain. If only they could talk, they would tell K1 all about… Everything. The birds, the name of the clouds, the vastness of the ocean. They would tell K1 about the lights in the city.

Instead, though, Player just beeps and looks down at their HUD. Poking the screen makes it wake up with a jingle and a proud display of the Korp logo. K1 understands the cue to move ahead, away from the sight of whatever reckoning is out there. 

(Out there, waiting for them.)

“We’ll see it soon,” assures K1 as if reading Player’s thoughts. He sounds like he’s trying to reassure himself as well. When Player looks up at him, he cracks a crooked grin at them. “K1 and Player are going to save Klaus. Good team! Then see the whole world.” 

It’s a pleasant thought. But Player cannot withdraw from their programming so easily; the itch to test, to keep moving, remains even after all this time removed from their surveillance room. It has long since stopped being an uncomfortable nagging and has become a painful ringing in their electric brain that is only worsened by the harsh environment of the incoming violet levels. 

Player closes their eyes and count seagulls until the pain fades to something more tolerable. When they open them again, K1 needs help crossing this Electric Purgatory.

\---

Klaus is… Alive. 

He’s alive, despite that tantrum. And the ripping. And the disintegration. The electricity makes him invincible! He remembers vaguely being in Dad’s office, but he must’ve left eventually, because here he is, back in the Electric Heaven. 

He barks out a somewhat hysterical laugh, even though everything hurts and he smells burned. He feels good, actually, really good. The pain isn’t even anything compared to whatever this is. Bright. Powerful. _Alive_.

He doesn’t need friends. He doesn’t need some ghost guiding him or some lumbering hairy idiot to clear the way. He’s got the Generator, this bright violet monument to everything Klaus is now. He can feel her, zipping through every cable and nerve. She is a bright mess of an Aphrodite, a humming giggling force of something Klaus cannot explain but needs now more than ever. 

“When did I get so smart?” Klaus asks the name on his wrist. 

“Klaus,” says his wrist. 

\---

The Doctor Spiegel nurses headache and a glass of scotch as he sits in front of the cameras. Years they had worked with minimal maintenance, and now every other monitor either flickers or goes out completely. This, he knows, is at least partially the K2’s fault. In fact, he had reason to believe it was only the K2 vandalising the test proper, but he had captured the fleeting imagery of K1 running through the electric floor, carrying something in his arms. At first he had thought it a pile of K2 and K2000 clothing, but then he had slowed down the grainy footage.

And Doctor Spiegel had suddenly realized why all his contacts to the QA department had gone unanswered.

K1 has the QA assistant, and is removing vital testing apparatus as he went along.

Really, Doctor Spiegel thinks, he needs to do something about this. But one of the cameras catches a view of the QA assistant, and suddenly he can’t move from his seat. He pauses the feed and stares, wide-eyed, at a face he had so diligently avoided. And when he looks at it, he cannot help but dwell.

_Klaus Spiegel can still hear her screams._

When the dust settled... There had stood their legacy: a pile of machinery reduced to rubble and scrap metal, a shower of broken glass all over the floor, oil and blood commingling together, thick and rank. He had found the K1 a few rooms away, unconscious and fetal on the floor.  
He’d seen his own face under those wild and bloodied locks, and he could not bear to destroy it. One of the first responders takes the K1 and pulls it away from the wreckage. 

Julia's lab smells like her perfume, has a wilting dozen roses he hadn't bought her, has the QA system set up, sitting limply on the worktable like a broken doll, and charging.

He looks over the shell of an android she'd built. He had argued against it, said they’d only needed a shell for the program. But she had argued back and he didn't (couldn't) say no, and so she'd set to work in making herself a robot of her own vision.

He doesn't look down at the face of a Klaus.

The nose isn't his (though it's still strong in its bridge), and the eyes are the wrong shape. The cheekbones are softer, the lips fuller and wider set. There is a distinct femininity to it that the K2000s don't have.

But, he notes, Julia had not made this robot in her image.

There are traits, yes, but there is a specific slenderness and a peculiar smallness to the robot that is simply not like her general shape. The robot's jawline is sharper.

It looks like...

Klaus feels sick.

In a moment of rage he yanks the shell of her half-built golem to the ground, forces the cables out of the wall and slams it to the linoleum. Bits and bobs that hadn't been fastened tightly enough to it skitter over the floor to be lost under filing cabinets and workbenches.

The mess of limbs fall in a way that looks even more like a broken doll. Guilt weighs down Klaus until he sits next to it on the floor and pulls its head into his lap.  
He can't help but trace those features with the pad of his thumb. If it weren't for the pale skin, the sunken eyes, the lack of hair in some spots (and of course the smallness), it could be her. It's a stretch, but there is a distinct Julia quality to it that has him aching.

A Julia-ness, he thinks to himself with a wheezy little laugh between tears.

He'll finish what she started, he resolves. Damn the company and damn the funds and damn if he has to build this thing out of scraps, he'll finish this robot and the code. He'll have his QA bot.

This time when he pushes her golem out of his lap, there is a bit of tired guilt to the motion that turns his actions into something gentlemanly. He picks it up under the arms and sets it back on the worktable to study it once more.

The transparent fibres attached to their head look white. He wonders if he should keep it.  
Maybe he'll dye it black to match the rest of his workers. Maybe he'll make it pink, like she had been.

He has a long time to decide, he supposes.

 

\---

Player loves puzzles. They love the satisfaction of a job well done, the thrill of figuring out a new way to solve something, each step a new adventure. Player loves puzzles, except right now they hate them. 

This puzzle was specifically designed for Klaus and K1 to solve together. Which is, of course, an impossible feat right now. So Player’s left angrily glaring at their HUD, pretending to think this through while K1 fidgets.

“K1 and Player can go through the maintenance halls again?” 

Player shakes their head and points to a camera. No good in this area. Either the man in the painting or Klaus will be watching their every move. They don’t need to let the mad men know they’ve been cheating, or Player will see a pink slip in their future. 

K1 grumbles. 

Player wonders where all the human employees went. What happened to them? 

The ideal would be they either got killed by a neurotoxin-spewing robot, or figured out Boss was a maniac and left before things got worse. Reality was usually more boring than the imagination, especially if it was your entire purpose to think abstractly. 

“K1 doesn’t like this purple place.” says K1, pacing off to the perimeter of this level. 

Player finds themself agreeing. 

Boss probably fired them all or something and gave the jobs to the K2000s. Or built machines who could do the jobs better.

Player’s fidgeting becomes more irate as a solution eludes them. There’s no way they can get through this area without getting caught--

K1 comes back with three wall mounted cameras in his hand, sticking them within player’s line of sight. Their eyebrows shoot up into their hairline. K1 gives them a sheepish smile, and sets the broken cameras on the floor. 

It’s in Player’s protocol to report vandalism to company property, but for the moment that’s out of their mind; K1 scoops them up and begins to push through what he can of the level to the nearest maintenance hall. 

“The faster we get to Klaus, the faster K1 can show you and him the lights!” says K1.

Player can only hope that’s true.


	4. A Cry For Help

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oh no.

Chapter 4

_Well,_ Klaus thinks to himself, _I’m fucked._

He can hear laughter in the distance, can hear K1’s steps shaking the floor. So Player did send the brute after him, after all! What an absolute pain in the ass. 

Player, that is. Though he supposes having to fight K1 all over again, too.

Not, though, like it’ll be a challenge this time. 

He smiles to himself, chuckling. One hit with his new powers, and K1 doesn’t stand a chance! He’s unstoppable! He’s free! He’s… He’s….

He’s going to be sick.

Klaus doubles over, and for a moment only shudders before oil spills out from his teeth onto the violet floor. For a moment he hovers, panting, and wipes his mouth off on his sleeve.

Okay, so, still not fully over the symptoms. At least he doesn’t feel like his body’s being torn apart anymore. 

“Let’s just take it easy for now,” he whispers to himself and to the black stain on his sleeve. And fifteen feet off the ground, reclines backwards with a pleased sigh. 

\---

The Quality Assurance Robot 01 is _ruining the test proper._

Doctor Spiegel’s shaking hand grips the handle of his “World’s Best Boss” coffee mug until his knuckles are stark white. All those protocols, all those failsafes he put into place to make sure nothing went wrong! God, the robot doesn’t even have a complete hull, and its presence has still somehow changed the fundamental rules of the game! 

He drains the last of his coffee and slams it on his desk. The previously unused PA speaker is enticing now. He turns it on experimentally, listening to it pop like an old record player. 

“Attention all personnel: we have a rogue employee from the QA division.” his voice is hoarse from disuse. “Apprehend the employee and its _accomplice_ and prevent them from compromising the test!”

_Don’tthinkaboutitdon’tthinkaboutitdon’tthinkaboutitdon’tthinkaboutitdon’tthinkaboutit--_

Player clamps their hands over their ears and squeezes their eyes shut as Boss’ PSA rings through the maintenance halls. They don’t need to be reminded that they’re breaking protocol, that they’re _cheating_ , that they’re failing at their one purpose. 

K1, below them, stops. Player opens their eyes and gives him a questioning look. The K2000s will be after them any second now! They can’t afford to slow down!

 

“Dad mentioned K1…” he says, looking toward the ceiling for any sign of a speaker. “Dad _remembered_ K1.” 

But K1 too is broken out of his reverie- the whir of a K2000 approaching interrupts his thoughts, and when he looks around the narrow maintenance hall he sees four on each end. 

_Well,_ thinks Player, _this is it. Rebellion was fun while it lasted._

But K1 bursts out a big belly laugh, utterly overjoyed and with a mischievous glint in his eye. Carefully, he sets Player on his shoulder so as to free his hands. Back in the moment, and thoroughly confused, they fumble for K1’s HUD. 

“Hahaha! Let’s play!” Before it can attack him, K1 grabs the nearest K2000 and in a blur of yellow and white, thoroughly embeds it into the concrete wall. It convulses, emitting a shower of sparks, before going limp. Player gapes while below K1 pushes through the bum-rush of K2000s. In his wake are the shells of the robots crushed under him.

“K1 and Player can’t fight in these halls!” K1 yells. “K1 and Player need to find a new way!”

Player shakes their head. They can’t go back to the main path! They tap their finger on Klaus’ HUD urgently. 

“Player!” K1 says in a moment of reprieve. He picks them up off his shoulder and holds them at arm’s length. His face is soft, but determined. “K1 trusted you. Now it’s your turn to trust K1.”

Player stares for only a moment before their gaze crystallizes into tenacity. They nod, and K1 grins. “Let Klaus come! K1 and Player will be ready for him!”

K1 puts Player back on his shoulders and takes a few steps back. He braces himself against the floor before dashing shoulder first into the far wall, where it crumples underneath him. The ambient music of the Purple electricity chimes, and K1 grins. 

“Shortcut.” 

Player gives a shuddering sigh and stares at the hole K1 made. They are _so_ fired. 

\---

This puzzle is easy, and their head is thrumming. Player leans back in K1’s arms as he maneuvers the puzzle, their eyes shut and running as little programs as possible if only to relieve the headache a little bit. Let K1 make decisions. Even if they’re bad ones, they’re his choice. And that’s what Klaus wants, right? 

“Can K1 talk? Or will it hurt Player?” he asks, hefting them up. Without opening their eyes they turn on the articulated motor program and pats K1’s cheek as permission. 

“Klaus is crazy!” K1 says incredulously. Player snorts. “Klaus wrote on the walls ‘test’. K1 has to help him! Like how Player helps K1. Test...”

Player cracks one eye open and waits for their aperture to focus before seeing that yes, Klaus has removed part of the paneling on the purple wall to read TEST. 

K1 continues on with the level, nodding to the quiet rhythm of the electric vents. The bouncing is a little nauseating, but Player can’t throw up so they try to ignore it as most as they can. “Klaus…. Has short-circuited. K1 knows how that feels. K1 was the same…” 

He stops for a long time. It’s not till the door is in sight that he speaks again. 

“So now it’s just K1 and Player…” he muses, quietly. “K1 thought it might be weird to say, but… I remember you.”

_What._

K1 nods, opening the door slightly only to pause. “Dad finished Player last year! K1 saw the videos. Dad tossed the videos all away so Klaus or you couldn’t find them.” 

Player tries to think about this. They have vague memories of testing, of small games and toys given to them to gauge their motor skills and their problem-solving abilities, but it’s a hazy blur. Maybe they were turned off between then and now. 

“Dad tossed garbage in the basement. Sometimes there were movies in the garbage. And K1 could watch some of them, and he saw you. Dad brought you toys and games, and he'd let Player play with them for a while, and then he'd turn off Player.”

Player feels hollow. A bright awful hole in their chest below their core. They'd been turned on before guiding Klaus, before being 'hired'. They'd been tested themself, by Dr. Spiegel personally. They wonder if they buried those memories in a private folder for a reason, or if Dr. Spiegel put a block on them.

Their core makes a notice pop up in front of Player's eyes, a projection only thry can see. They're drawing an awful lot of power from it, they are told. They need to conserve energy until they get plugged back in, or else K1 will be down a guide. 

Player tries not to think about what that means. About them going back to their offices after all this, after turning off auxillary power forever in favor of the cables that connect to the nape of their neck. But the eventuality is a truth, the solution to a mathimatical inequality. It is as inevitable as the rest of this. 

"Sorry K1 doesn't talk as much as Klaus," he says, dashing through as the cameras above them shudder. "But Player!" he laughs- no, giggles- and holds them up to see their face. "Player doesn't talk at all! So why's K1 apologizing?" to prove true he's just being silly, he pokes Player's nose. He's broken them out of their reverie, bless him, and Player smiles at him- an imperfect but real smile. 

Imperfect but real. Put that as the Korp tagline. 

"We'll save Klaus!" K1 says. He gives Player a gentle toss upwards before uppercutting to a higher platform before picking them up again. "Klaus isn't at fault. However he doesn't know what it's like to feel trapped."

Player frowns. They're not so sure about that. Everyone in this damned facility has felt it. Maybe some later rather than sooner, but it's just a constant across the board, some intuitive malware in the Korp brand. It's awful, but it's how it is. No one in this electric limbo has ever known freedom except for te man running the place, and in a rare spark of empathy, Player doubts he's felt it for a very long time. 

"K1 likes to escape! To see new places! To explore! K1 saw only one color before but now he sees a lot. He can look out windows. He can ses the lights!" the mobile platform is slow under Player's distracted hand. The window. The lights. The rain. The hollowness in them feels a little heavier.

"Player doesn't mind K1 talking about himself, do they?" K1 pets their hair and frowns at the cobweb that accumulates on his fingers. When they shake their head, he grins. "I like purple. What color does Player like?"

They've been asked a lot of questions since they've started this job, running the gamut from generic to oblique to existential. But all of the queries hadn't been about them- "where am I? Who am I? What challenge next? What happens if I fail?" Klaus had always been too distracted to wonder about who was on the other side of the cameras. 

But K1... K1. Curious, kind, and certainly strong, still finds time between the stress of the electric floor to keep track of his little robot buddy. A question so simple as "what's your favorite color?" makes the weight on Player's shoulders feel a little less heavy. 

So they flip their HUD to a few security screenshots they had routinely taken during the offices. "Blue!" K1 says with a grin, and nods. "K1 likes blue too. Like the sky?" 

Player doesn't know what kind of blue the sky is. They shrug. 

"Mmm... What else? K1 likes sushi and white wine! Has Player eaten anything?" 

Shit memory or no shit memory, Player can attest that no they have not. Their quickfiles dictate that sushi is an artfully prepared raw fish and that white wine is something the Boss likes, so neither sound particularly appetizing. They make a face. 

Instead of laughing, K1 comes to a halt. Player twists around in his arms to see the doors in front of the two. 

"Klaus is here." 

Player cannot scour a single good outcome of this intervention. 

"I hope that Klaus remembers K1... Klaus helped K1." he says with a deepening frown. "K1 and Player have to save Klaus, from himself." 

He opens the door.

 

"You again." 

The words are dangerous, a barely concealed threat. Like a cat puffing up its fur or a swan spreading his wings, the meaning is clear: don't come any closer. 

Thankfully, K1 gets the message. He stops, fidgeting. His fingers fist around Player's shirt in a death grip- they can feel his pistons enter locked mode. 

The room is bright and hot and almost painfully so for both- Player's apertures have narrowed into tiny pinpricks of light and can only infer that K1's have done the same, and he's staring up at Klaus. 

Up, because he's lounging midair in that same bubble of crackling blue aura. He looks better kept than when Player last saw him; they wonder if he was waiting here. 

"K1," he says, in fake pity, "you're just being manipulated by _that._ " 

Player does not have to do any logical loupes to figure out who he is referring to. Instead of anger, like they should feel, like they want to feel, that hollowness turns to sickness. 

Manipulated. By them. Player, a manipulator. Something in their protocols sends an alert that goes unread. 

"K1 was like you." his voice wavers. Not out of uncertainty, but anxiety; he's holding Player in a more protective gesture, ready to chield them from any of Klaus' retaliations. 

But Klaus only grins- unsettlingly wide, his eyes an impossible blue, and malice filling his face. "Then you should understand why I have to do this." 

K1 realizes that he can't talk Klaus out of this- he looks upset, perhaps a little confused at first, but he sets Player down and smiles up at Klaus whilst pounding his fist into his palm. Steam releases around the joints, and he yells "Haha, let's play!" 

"I'm not dependant on you, anymore! On either of you! Can't you see that I'm fre now?"

"I'M FREE!"

There's a blast of blue-white lightning from Klaus, just as K1 rears back a punch, and then Player's emergency reset puts them into mandatory reboot. 

“Wow! Wow. I’m not exactly a Big Daddy, y’know. I didn’t expect to give you this much of a beating!” Klaus lets out a slightly hysterical giggle. “It’s a wonder what wonders you can do, when you’re out of range of getting clocked by the big guy.” he nods in the direction of K1, who stands defensively, ready to throw another punch as soon as Klaus comes within distance. Though he may as well be worlds away from Player, who’s wooen up stranded on the floor on the opposite end of the room. When Klaus stops levitating, he makes a point to step on the HUD that directed him and kicks it so it goes skidding out of their reach. 

So this must be what pain feels like, Player thinks.

“I don’t know what you see in each other, but I can imagine your reaction when he kicks the bucket. This whole place needs someone to look after it when you’re gone… And I just happen to invest in damaged goods.” 

If Klaus had something else to say, he doesn’t get a chance to recite it- K1’s fist connects with the back of his head and he goes tumbling, just barely floating again when he nearly trips over Player. He wavers, the blue crackling aura that surrounds him making a few popping noises, and collapses with steam wisping into the air. 

K1 yells wordlessly and runs forward to pull Player off the ground. He holds them in one arm and scavenges the HUDs. 

Player beeps urgently, pointing back to the smoldering ruin of the man who had been their friend. 

K1 looks back, wild-eyed, and shakes his head. 

Player jabs the air in his direction. Blue light is surrounding Klaus again, the air smelling like ozone and burnt hair. 

“No!” cries K1, but Player snatches their HUD and guides him over. “K1 will not finish Klaus!” he digs his heels into the ground, and

and

and the world is a pure white flash, bright and ending. K1 screams underneath them, a low note of agony. Player’s systems let out a series of emergency notifications, overlapping all at once, and everything bleeds into a singular, horrible, high-pitched ringing. 

Player opens their mouth, alarms blaring, and shouts out a single cry for help.

 

 

 

Far off in his office, Dr. Spiegel looks up from an old photograph to his monitor.


	5. The Hitchhiker's Guide To "Korporative" Mechanics

Chapter 5 

"What the...? How long have I been out? Player? K1?" Klaus picks himself up off the floor and staggers to his feet. None of his body seems to be worse for wear, because he's not at a respawn point, but god, his head is He opens his eyes, and gapes in horror at the subject of his ramblings.

Across the room: a smoldering wreck, molten metal, sparks flying every which way. The smell of burnt hair and ozone hangs heavy around the figure. 

And under the mess that was once K1, Player.

Klaus gives himself a start seeing Player-- It's a strange mixture of deja vu, as if he's not seeing them for the first time, though he must be. He's no stranger to people who look just like him, after meeting K1, avoiding K2000s, and seeing the portrait of the man who started it all. 

But still, they look awful.

Maybe it's because he attacked them and K1, but Player looks more worse for wear the longer he observes them-- part of their silicon skin has begun to peel off around their eyes, making their black apertures even larger and more gaunt. One of the little yellow LEDs inlaid is flickering faintly as they pull themself out from under K1, their fingers misfiring the whole time. One arm has been crushed and is hanging off its frame, and Klaus can bear to watch no longer. 

"Here, let me--" He rushes over to them, two steps before he's squatting in front of Player, ready to wrench them free. 

But Player flinches away, pulls from his touch, their eyes looking up at him in apprehension. Two pinpricks of golden light flicker, searching his face for any sign of aggression. 

"I'm not gonna hurt you, I just want to help y--"

He's cut off by a crack of noise and then a shock of pain-- Player, in a last ditch effort to defend themself, had slapped him. light blue filaments like those a plasma globe cross between their skin and his. His whole body twists with the movement and he sees stars, a hand fluttering to the offending cheek and giving a bewildered look to Player. 

"Okay," he concedes, "I deserved that."

Without the momentum of the smack, Player's hand had dropped to the floor useless. Chunks of silicon skin have been scraped away, and hydraulics are visible in their grotesque positions. It's disgusting, and he cringes. How that must hurt, he can't imagine. 

Klaus watches Player examine the damage. Their brain is running the same diagnostics script as his, he can tell. What can be fixed? What needs scrapping? What can they recycle?

But Player does something unprecedented: they self-operate

. Rather, they pull off even more silicon, just under their barcode, to expose the hydraulics beneath. With no regards to Klaus, or seemingly their own pain, they shove their hand into the open wound.

"Ew, that's disgusting!" Klaus recoils. Every movement of their intruding hand sends their broken fingers into a fit of twitches, like some greyish five-legged bug on its back. Player glares up at him, and without breaking eye contact, fishes a wire out of their arm. "Don't tell me you're going to--"

They snap it, and their whole arm fritzes out. Klaus yells in phantom pain- he can't imagine how that must feel, how much it must hurt! But Player takes the wire and locates K1's face. 

"Oh no..." Klaus shakes his head in shame. "if the respawn point hasn't fixed him, I don't think you can force a reboot." He feels sick, and he's not sure why- guilt, maybe. Panic, too. Withdrawal? "There has to be a way, Player."

Wait.

"Player, playing. a game, an HUD! A code! Player, you're a genius!" If he knew he wouldn't throw up for trying, Klaus could pick up the QA assistant and spin them around. "We have to hack into the automated system of the facility and ask for a reboot for K1!"

Player nods and finally squirms the rest of the way out from under K1, lifting their good arm up to Klaus. As if in sync, he crouches down and hefts them up. "Oof. Alright, Player, let's do this! Let's save K1!"

\---

THIS TRANSCRIPT IS FOR KORP PERSONNEL ONLY.

KLAUS  
Korp Interractive Fiction - a science fiction story.   
Copyright 2072 by Korp Inc. All rights reserved.   
Release 69, serial 01001011

You wake up. The room, if it can be classified as one, is spinning very gently around your head. Or at least it would be if you could see it which you can't. 

It is pitch black. 

>say "this isn't a game! This is a fanfiction written in the style of a text adventure!"

Talking to yourself is a sign of impending mental collapse. 

> import sprites. 

Atta boy. 

>Inventory

You have:  
A splitting headache  
No friends

>Har har. Walk right. 

You slide across the uneven, improperly rendered tiles. Good going importing those. 

>Were you always this sassy?

Command box for actions only. 

>Don't be a smartass. I'm beginning to wish you were silent again. 

Command box for actions only. 

>Look for a door.

There is a door on a platform above you. From a third person perspective it would be towards the right. 

>jump up and doublejump and open it. 

Too many prepositions. 

>jump up.

Unable to recognize 'jump'. 

>hop. 

Your second grade level vocabulary catapults you directly into the edge of the upper platform. You try to think of some suitable last words, but what with the confusion of the moment and the spinning in your head, you fail to come up with anything plithy and expire in silence. 

>bullshit

Don't swear. 

>doublejump up

You nail the platform. Off in the distance, beyond the cacophonous attempts at background music and the constant static screeching, you hear a familiar deep chuckle. 

>examine

You know this to be a Lifestate, a backup consciousness drive built for most complex AIs and evidently sentient ones as well. It can be likened to a black box, if you're feeling in the mood for a simile. Like a black box, it is an orange-ish yellow. 

>enter door

Through the door you find a room pretty much similar to the one you came out of. Parts and Services whirrs around you in the dim, and the industry of Korp sounds all the more menacing as k2000s are assembled around you. 

>examine k2000

They're hard to see in the low light, but they look pretty bad. Almost as bad as someone you beat down earlier. But no hard feelings. 

>search room

The items able to be added to your inventory in this room are:  
A growing sense of frustration  
A comb

>take comb

Thief. 

>take growing sense of frustration

It was in you all along. 

>Look for a door.

None visible. There is a corridor with a reddish light at the end. 

>go down corridor

You'd head down the corridor, but this too is improperly rendered and is hard to see. 

>find a fucking light 

Don't swear. There is a light switch at the threshold of the hall.

>turn on light 

Vision floods you, to the dismay of your headache! Now you can see the entirety of android hell and its poorly designed sprites. The red light in the corridor remains a red light in the corridor. At the end of the hall is a room.

> enter room 

This room features a spike pit, a key, a lock, and a door as well as several platforms. It looks mostly incomplete. To the side, away from puzzle elements, is a conveyor belt conveying K2 parts towards the red glow. 

>examine

What would you like to examine?

>spikes

You kick the side of a spike with your foot. To your surprise, it exudes all the danger of a particularly small traffic cone. 

>key

It certainly exists. Out of your reach, as a matter of fact. 

>examine key 

It is high up on a ledge. The ledge has an easy way and a hard way up. Notably one route leads to a flashing bauble. 

>doublejump up

You, colloquially put, "do that". 

>examine hard way

The difficult path up is obviously the way towards the secret bauble. 

>go 

Where would you like to go? 

>go hard way

You certainly try. The harmless spikes are the least of your problems when the poorly-rendered catwalk crumbles under your feet and sends you careening towards machinations the names of which elude you. you land squarely on a conveyor belt.

Damage taken: -12 to your pride.

>thanks player

We here at Korp. are happy to please. 

>examine conveyor belt

It is headed at an industrious pace towards an incinerator. 

>run away

You get nowhere fast.

>wait

The conveyor belt brings you closer to the incinerator. You realize that this is what's been lighting the room. 

>inspect incinerator.

What you can see beyond the glow is a mass of K2 parts. You begin to panic.

>dont 

Don't what? 

>dont panic

Why not? The situation seems to be calling for it.

>player

There's no verb in that sentence!

>panic

Not surprised.

Your panicked flailing makes you fall off the side of the conveyor belt. You are back on the floor where you started, and you are beginning to feel uncomfortably warm by how close to the incinerator you are. 

>move away

You are back towards the puzzle elements. 

>solve puzzle

It's not that easy. 

>

>

>

>

The bauble is hot in your hands. 

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

>

You remember this. 

[DATA EXPUNGED]


End file.
